


You Can Always Come To Me

by Crowlows19



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Batfamily Feels, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Protective Bruce Wayne
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-08-20 01:40:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20219665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowlows19/pseuds/Crowlows19
Summary: Each boy had come to him with different kinds of problems over the years and Bruce had always tried to do his best to get them through those hard times.





	1. Dick

The relationship between Batman and Robin had to be built on trust or it would never work. Bruce had known that from the beginning, and he’d done a lot of work to make sure that whomever was in that armor knew they could come to him, with anything, no questions asked. He hadn’t been perfect by any stretch of the imagination. There had been fights and stony silences and more than a few times when one of those Robins essentially ran away from home. 

But no matter what problem they were currently going through, all his boys knew that no matter what the problem was, no matter what was going on, they could always bring it to Bruce. Sometimes he had to pry it out of them, and other times they sought him out. He had always found it very telling about which problems each of them chooses to bring to him. 

The older Dick got the less and less he would talk about what was bothering him, so determined was he to strike out on his own as soon as possible and make a name for himself, as himself. However, there was one moment that had always stood out to Bruce as the moment that he'd known that no matter what was happening in their relationship, Dick was his son and he knew that it was always safe to come to Bruce. 

Dick had been seventeen years old when one night he'd come up to Bruce in the kitchen with a panicked look on his face. Alfred had been in bed for a while and Bruce was in there making coffee and planning to pull an all nighter to prepare for a Wayne Enterprises board meeting he'd forgotten about. Dick should have been in bed, asleep, and he was in sweatpants and a t-shirt. Based on his messy hair, Bruce was almost positive that the boy had at least tried to fall asleep. 

He wandered in, clutching his cell phone, clearly upset. 

"Are you alright?" Bruce asked cautiously. Dick eyed the papers and laptop spread across the breakfast table as if they would save him and then shifted uncomfortably on his bare feet. Bruce was getting more worried by the second. "Dick, what's wrong?”

"I don't know what to do," Dick said. 

"Don't know what to do about what?" Bruce asked. He was trying to keep his voice steady, but he'd never really seen Dick act like this. Scared, grieving, and pissed off were all emotions Bruce had seen from him over the years, but this odd anxiousness was new. He wasn't sure what to do with it. 

Dick looked at him, his eyes wide, and Bruce could physically see the moment Dick finally got his courage. The look in his eyes shifted and he crossed the kitchen, pulling something out of the pocket of his sweatpants. He handed it to Bruce, who set his cup of coffee on the counter so he could use both hands to examine what he immediately recognized as a syringe case. Bruce opened it and found two syringes, one unused, and one with residue. He felt something go down his spine. It would take him years to admit that it had been panic. 

"Where did you get this?" he asked, voice forcefully calm. Dick shifted on his feet again and Bruce was shocked to see that the kid looked as if he was about to cry. 

"I stole them," Dick finally said. 

"From who?" 

But Dick wouldn't answer, and Bruce went through the list of people in his head that Dick could have possibly stolen this from. If it had been a part of case or if he'd taken it from someone while in uniform, they wouldn't even be having this strange conversation. Dick was well trained, and he knew exactly what the protocol was for handling something like this while on the job. Likewise, if he'd taken it from one of Bruce's teammates, he would have known about it almost immediately. Dick tattled on Bruce's team all the time whether it was something he thought was funny like Flash stealing his coffee or something serious like someone having a PTSD episode in the locker room. 

This was personal; deeply personal. 

That meant that this came from one of Dick's friends. 

"Did this come from a friend of yours?" Bruce asked him, finally setting the case down on the counter. He didn't want to touch it anymore. Dick nodded and Bruce could see him working up to answering again. He gripped his phone, tapped at the screen a couple of times, and then handed it to Bruce. 

He read through a group message comprised of Dick's teammates, Donna, Wally, and Garth. Noticeably absent was Roy and that was because the entire chain of messages was about Roy's apparent drug issue. Garth had been the first to realize and he'd shared it with the others, not sure what to do. Wally had wanted to tell but then a couple days later had reported that he'd been too scared to tell Barry. They were all convinced that Roy being caught was going to get him kicked out of home and fired from being Speedy, which to these teens was a tragedy unto itself. Bruce took a moment when it hit him just how young they were.

Finally, the messages came to the part where Dick had stolen the case and he'd told the others he would tell. He was their leader; he should be the one to do it. That had been right before he'd come downstairs to do just that. Bruce handed him the phone back and picked up that case again. 

"I'll handle it from here," he said. "You did the right thing telling me. I'll make sure Roy gets what he needs, okay?" 

The look of utter relief in Dick's eyes made Bruce melt a little. He gripped the kid's shoulder as he passed him on his way out of the kitchen. 

"Go to sleep," he said over his shoulder. "You have a chemistry test tomorrow." 

"How do you even know that?" Dick exclaimed, momentarily distracted. 

"I'm Batman!" 

00000 

Oliver had been on monitor duty that night. Things had been quiet so even though that was supposed to be a two-person job, he'd been up there by himself. Bruce had known that and taken advantage of it. Oliver had been surprised to see him and shocked when Bruce shut the door and then removed his cowl. He had never done such a thing before and he would only ever do it once again, many years later, under very different circumstances. 

Telling Oliver about what Dick had told him took three hours and Bruce didn't rush it even though he was horribly late to his board meeting. He refused to leave until he was certain that when Oliver left to confront Roy, it was with a level head and not emotion. 

"Tell Dick thanks," Oliver said as he prepared to leave. Bruce had agreed to finish out his shift for him. 

"I will," Bruce replied and Oliver left, his shoulders hunched and the needle case in his hand.

It was Superman who had found him on duty an hour or two later. 

"Isn't this Green Arrow's shift?" he asked. "What are you doing here?" 

"Helping out Robin," Batman replied, vaguely. He'd never elaborated, and Superman had never asked. 

He'd just known not to.


	2. Jason

Jason's anger was mostly hot air in Bruce's opinion. He knew the boy had some genuine anger underneath his blustery attitude but really, who in the family didn't?

However, there were two triggers that Bruce knew of that would send Jason spiraling over the edge into a rage so dark that nothing could pull him out but his own exhaustion. One of those triggers was the Joker and the other was Willis Todd, Jason's long lost, petty criminal father. 

Willis had left the family and Gotham a long time ago following a brief stint in Blackgate for a botched robbery. He had left his son to his drug addicted wife and later to the streets of Crime Alley where Bruce had finally picked him up. After he'd made Jason but the tire back on the car, of course. 

Over the years, he'd always wondered if Jason had any interest in his father but the boy had never asked, not even when he found his birth certificate. It had been his mother he'd been determined to find and his father he'd been determined to leave behind. If anyone had so much as mentioned Willis, Jason would practically shut down for days, his only emotion a deep, dark anger that would later come to frighten Bruce in its intensity. 

That trigger would only get worse after Jason was resurrected and then legally brought back into the fold. When he'd been declared alive, the intense media storm surrounding him and the family had led to the vultures flying out of the woodwork, looking for their fifteen minutes of fame and handouts. Willis Todd had been no exception. 

After more than a decade of silence, Willis had reached out to Jason, and Jason, in a move that had actually shocked Bruce, had agreed to meet with him. Bruce suspected it had been a moment of intense vulnerability. After all, it was one thing to bluster about your father to your brothers over drinks at the bar and another thing entirely to say it to their face. Jason could say it Bruce's face because he knew Bruce wouldn't throw him out. Willis Todd was not someone Jason knew how to deal with. 

And so, it had taken Willis Todd nearly no time at all to worm his way back into Jason's life, his apartment, and his wallet. And it had taken Jason a few weeks of feeling completely humiliated before he'd turned up without warning at Wayne Enterprises and hid in Bruce's office until he came out of a four hour marketing meeting. His assistant had texted him about Jason's arrival some two hours previously and Bruce had honestly thought the boy would have long given up by the time he'd gotten out. 

Jason was actually the one who stopped by the office the most, usually to take a credit card out of Bruce's desk or return the keys to a car he'd taken without asking. The employees were more or less used to him by now. 

"Are you hungry?" Bruce asked by way of hello, holding out a ham sandwich his assistant had gotten him from the cafe in the lobby. Jason shook his head no. He was sitting on the couch in corner, looking absolutely miserable. "What's wrong?"

Bruce sat next to him, sandwich forgotten on the coffee table, and listened for a solid hour as Jason had ranted and raved about Willis Todd. He didn't tell Bruce anything he didn't already know; Bruce was the one that paid that credit card bill every month and he was perfectly aware of all the things Willis had been buying for himself with it. 

"I don't know how to get rid of him. I can’t deal with him anymore Bruce. He’s making me feel so angry that all I want to do is put my fist through the wall,” Jason finally ended. He'd long gotten up to pace the length of Bruce's office and finally Bruce stood up as well. He buttoned his suit jacket, straightened the sleeve, and rolled his shoulders a little. 

"I'll take care of it," Bruce told him. He waited just long enough to allow Jason to interject if he wanted and, being met with no resistance, walked out of the office. 

00000

Willis was hosting a few friends when Bruce walked into the apartment he'd given Jason when he'd made his press debut as a long lost son found alive. It was one of several that Jason had in the city. He never really used it as it was technically a safe house with little room for his gear. Bruce suspected it would have to be dumped now that Willis had been it for longer than a span of two seconds. 

The smoke in the living room air was thick, there were empty beer bottles every where, and Bruce caught the odor of meth. He went unnoticed by Willis and his three friends, two of whom were already passed out, until he picked up the remote off the side table and turned off the TV. 

"What the fuck?" Willis exclaimed as the horse race disappeared. He swiveled around and immediately caught sight of Bruce, looking wholly impressive in this three piece suit, scowling down at him. "Oh."

"Yes, oh," Bruce replied. "I see you've made yourself at home." Willis's sole conscious friend made a hasty retreat to the kitchen, sensing trouble. 

"Jason invited me to stay with him," Willis replied. Bruce could tell the man was intimidated; he wasn't stupid enough to presume that he could bully a Wayne while also asking for hand outs from the trust fund. 

"I doubt that Willis," Bruce told him. "You and I both know that Jason would hardly be alright with this." He pointedly looked at the two passed out men with clear disgust. 

Bruce would never admit it to Jason, but this was not the first time they had met. The first time had actually been over Jason's grave, on the first birthday following his death. He'd been surprised to see Willis there and was equally surprised by how he had instantly hated the man with every fiber of his being. Bruce didn't think he'd felt that much hatred for another person in his life, not even his parents' murderer. 

He and Willis had talked then and it had been made perfectly clear that Bruce hadn't thought much of the place Willis had in Jason's life. He knew that Willis had suspected this conversation was coming as soon as Jason let him in the door. 

"You know, you can't control him," Willis said, attempting confidence. Bruce raised an eyebrow at him. "That boy's a grown adult. He could do whatever he wants with his money."

"That's Wayne family money," Bruce reminded him. 

"Like you'd ever cut him off," Willis laughed. 

"True," Bruce acquiesced. "Willis, I'm not here about the money Jason's been giving you these past few weeks. I'm here because he asked me to get rid of you. You've over stayed your welcome and Jason has no interest in being used by you anymore."

Willis had a gob smacked look on his face that Bruce dearly wished he could punch. Willis had clearly been banking that Jason would not have the courage to either kick Willis out himself or ask Bruce to do it. 

"I want you out of this apartment within the hour or the doorman will be calling the police for your removal. If you take anything with you that wasn't already yours, I'll see you get thrown back into Blackgate. And if you ever contact my son again, I guarantee that you will sorely come to regret it. Wayne Enterprises owns the companies that you rent an apartment from, the bank you go to, and the diner you work for. So think very carefully about what your relationship with Jason will look like in the future."

They never did hear from Willis again and Jason had seemed perfectly fine with that outcome.

Bruce had spent that night with Jason, riding a barstool at the boy’s favorite haunt, and talking about nothing more personal than if the Knights would make the Super Bowl that year. He knew by Jason's hug good bye later that evening, that it had been enough.


	3. Tim

Tim would always be his most difficult child, Bruce knew. Looking back, Dick had been rather a model child, Jason rebellious but contained, and Damian had been just like him. He could deal with all them with relative ease. Tim, however, had been utterly wild and only Dick ever seemed to believe him. 

It was probably because when they were in uniform, Tim followed orders without question. He was smart enough to know that when Batman said to do something, it was for his own good. Sometimes, when they were home and showered, Tim would ask why certain things had to happen the way they did, and Bruce would explain.

It was clinical and professional. 

He was the kind of partner that Bruce had really needed after what had happened to Jason. Tim never once asked to not have Jason’s death hanging over him like a shadow. He’d embraced it instead. 

The rest of the superhero community had come to see the new Robin as efficient and calculating. Superman outright refused to believe him when Batman had called Tim wild during a Justice League meeting in which the conversation had somehow turned to Robin. They had mostly been praising the boy and Batman, annoyed with Tim about something else, had responded with, “He’s a wild child.” 

“How could he possibly be that wild?” Superman had asked, nearly laughing at him. 

“He shot me with a potato gun once,” Green Arrow butt in. “Hurt like a bitch.” 

“He’s wild,” Batman had responded and then left the Watchtower before anybody could make him elaborate further. They had just never seen Tim the same way he’d had, probably because they’d never had a sidekick like Tim. While, Impulse had once eaten an entire hot dog stand in a fit of desperate starvation, Tim had once hacked the League of Assassins, bringing Ra’s al Ghul himself to the house next door. That had required every ounce of diplomacy skill Bruce had possessed and cost him a favor or two. 

Tim claimed he’d been looking for antidote recipes for a poisoning case he’d been looking into. Bruce only kind of believed him. 

Never had Tim played a card too soon and when he finally did put the card on the table, no one had the ability to see the full strategy before it was played out. Bruce had managed to figure it out once and that had only been because Tim had been awake for four days and slipped up in his delirious mumbling. 

This Robin was incredibly independent, uninterested in normality, and quite possibly the reason Bruce’s hair had started to go gray. Unlike with his other Robins, Bruce had very limited control over Tim Drake. He was neither his parent nor his legal guardian, and if he wanted to stay the boy’s mentor, he had to be very careful about what boundaries he pushed at. There was zero doubt in Bruce’s mind that if Tim chose to, he could find a way to operate independently of the Batman no matter what Bruce’s feelings were. 

So, Bruce had always kept his distance, especially where Tim’s parents were concerned. Which was why he was thoroughly surprised that a thirteen-year-old Tim had told his school that it was Bruce they should call when they wanted to talk to a legal guardian. Apparently, the kid had paperwork to prove it and everything. He doubted any of it wasn’t forged, but it was still impressive. 

00000 

“Mr. Wayne, it’s lovely to see you again,” Headmaster Hammer greeted him, sounding genuine. Hammer had been the headmaster through both Dick's and Jason's tenure at Gotham Academy as well as his own brief and disastrous attempt when he'd been a child. He had also squeezed many donations from Bruce's bank account over the years. Bruce had paid for both the new library and the new scholarships. He had refused to pay for a new basketball court no matter how big Hammer offered to make the donor recognition plague. 

"I'm a little surprised to be here," Bruce told him honestly, letting his face settle into uncertainty as he took an offered cup of coffee. Hammer had even remembered that he liked to drink to it black. 

"Yes, well, I was also a little surprised when Timothy pulled you out of his pocket," Hammer replied, sitting in his own chair. He looked a little worn out. Bruce knew Tim had that effect on people. "I wasn't aware that he was staying with you." 

"Just until his parents are back," Bruce replied and was a little surprised to see Hammer grit his teeth in open annoyance. 

"Mr. Wayne, are you aware that this school has been incapable of getting in touch with Timothy's parents for nearly six months?" he asked, but then kept going without waiting for Bruce to respond. "Just last month I actually hired a private investigator to get in touch with them and all I got out of it was a note saying they understood they'd been out of touch and they'd try to make time to meet with me the next time they were in town. They've been gone this entire school year!" 

Bruce just sat there and let the man continue on for the better part of an hour. Timothy needed structure; the staff wanted Timothy in the dorms where they could keep an eye on him; Timothy had been falling asleep in class; Timothy wasn't turning in his homework; Timothy had been picking and choosing which classes he went to, deeming some to be a waste of his time and too boring for his short time on this earth. 

Finally, he ended with, "We didn't think you'd answer the phone, much less come to meet with us, which is not an indictment of you! We remember the other two quite fondly. It's Timothy! He pays people to act as temporary guardians to get him out of trouble. Strangers, Mr. Wayne, strangers! I would have called the police a year ago if I could prove it!" 

"What exactly is it you want me to do?" Bruce finally asked when the man paused to take a breath. 

"Whatever you can do, Mr. Wayne," Headmaster Hammer told him. "I am now in the position that if this child's situation does not start to improve immediately I will be forced to file reports with both Child Protective Services and the police for criminal neglect. The only reason we haven’t already done so is that damn lawyer the Drakes keep sending. The child is running wild! He does whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and quite frankly I'm shocked that he even still bothers to show up at all!" 

It took another half hour to calm Headmaster Hammer down enough to let Bruce leave and when he made it back into the main office, he found Tim sitting on a bench, looking completely miserable. Tim was smart enough to know that when he'd given the school Bruce's name that this very situation would occur. Bruce wondered how long Tim had been thinking about turning Bruce's name in as his legal guardian. They had never talked about such a thing, but he knew it was only a matter of time before someone cottoned on to what was happening in the Drake family. 

It also wasn't lost on Bruce what had just happened. Tim, in his own roundabout and slightly manipulative way, had just asked Bruce to take care of him, at least for now. 

And Bruce intended to do just that. 

"Can I have McDonald's?" Tim asked as Bruce drove them back to the Manor. 

"If you don't tell Alfred." 

"I won't if you won't."

"Deal."


	4. Damian

Damian was Bruce’s only biological child and therefore, the only child he could honestly see part of himself in. When Damian said something that threw Tim into fit, Bruce could honestly say that Tim would have never liked Bruce when he’d been a child. Because that insult that had just flown out of Damian’s mouth had sounded exactly like something he’d once said to a classmate. They’d ended up in a fist fight in the Gotham Academy parking lot, in much the same way Tim and Damian had ended up in a fist fight in the living room. 

The only real difference between Bruce and Damian was that while Bruce had been groomed to inherit an empire of wealth, Damian had been groomed to inherit an empire of killers. And really, that explained quite a lot.

Bruce had struggled with the weight of that expectation, especially after the death of his parents when the responsibility of the empire wasn’t some far off distant thing for adulthood but happening right now. He had barely been grieving for a week when the Board of Directors had sent a missive to the house asking for his approval regarding his father’s outstanding projects. 

He’d been eight years old. 

Alfred had thrown a fit. 

But Damian had a far different burden on his mind than the Board of Directors at Wayne Enterprises when he’d walked into Bruce’s office one day, dragging his bag across the ground behind him, and looking thoroughly miserable. He was still in his school uniform and his tie was unusually sloppy. It was usually Tim who was sloppy by the end of the day. His seventeen year old had been sent back to school following his reign as CEO, mostly because Bruce outright refused to let him go through life as a high school drop out, no matter smart he was. 

“Are you alright Damian?” he asked, peering at the boy over his laptop. Damian slumped in the chair and glared at his father across the desk. 

“Why do I have to go to this school?” he asked, not for the first time. “I know more than the teachers any way.”

“Good,” Bruce replied, finishing typing his sentence out. “I expect straight A’s until you graduate.”

Damian just sighed, clearly annoyed. 

“Father.” 

“Damian,” Bruce cut him off, closing the lid of his laptop. “School is important. If you’re really that bored, go ask your teachers for some more challenging extra credit. I’m sure they’ll oblige.”

“I can’t,” Damian responded, immediately. It was said so quickly that Bruce knew the boy was clearly worried about something. Damian’s defense was always to speak too quickly rather than to have a change in pitch like Jason or to stall like Dick. Tim was too good a liar and the only tell that kid had was a subtle twitch of his left eyelid. 

“Why not?” he asked. Damian had his full attention now but the boy didn’t answer. “Damian, why not?”

“The others will find out,” he responded. 

“The others? Your brothers?” he asked, slightly confused. The only person to ever make fun of something school related had been Jason who had been absolutely delighted to find out that Tim had once founded and then appointed himself President of the Sherlock Holmes Society at Gotham Academy. He’d teased Tim about it relentlessly until Tim had finally dug out his old potato gun from the back of Bruce’s closet and shot him, breaking three already fractured ribs. Tim had been grounded for a month. 

But Damian just shook his head. 

“You mean the other kids at school,” Bruce said, catching on. He had known that Damian’s assimilation into a normal cover life would be difficult for him. Damian simply hadn’t been raised to be normal. He had been treated like a prince his entire life and school, even one as prestigious and pampered as Gotham Academy, was bound to be a culture shock. 

Damian was smart and well educated to the point of being far above his peers. The problem was that Damian wasn’t one to hide it and while his brothers wouldn’t use it against him, Damian’s lack of socialization meant that he was wholly unprepared for the kind of war zone that school could be. The kids of Gotham Academy were all used to being the best, brightest, richest, and most spoiled. Damian had probably met his match and, since he knew the consequences of pulling a knife on a civilian, he was likely struggling to form a response. 

“They won’t leave me alone,” he finally said. “I don’t know how to get them to leave me alone. You won’t let me stab them.”

He sounded so forlorn at the fact that he couldn’t stab anyone that Bruce almost smiled. 

“Damian, all you really can do is ignore them,” he said, knowing it was actually really bad advice, but even he knew that if he called the school he would only make it much worse. He also knew that he couldn’t tell the boy the truth, which was if he punched the bully in the face, they’d definitely leave him alone. He knew it would only validate all of the wrong lessons for Damian. “Let them go their way and you go yours.”

“That’s not helpful,” Damian spat. 

“Who is it that won’t leave you alone?” Bruce asked, curious if he knew the name. Gotham Academy was small and he’d heard enough rants from the other boys through the years to know which families had bred bullies and which hadn’t.

“Some snit named Maxwell Cord,” Damian responded. “He’s in my math class.”

Bruce knew that name well. He’d had his own run ins with Maxwell’s father when they’d been students at Gotham Academy. More recently, and probably more relevant, was the run in Tim had with Maxwell. He’d called the police on a party that Maxwell had been at when the host had started to overdose on a new brand of ecstasy Jason had been investigating. Tim had said Maxwell had been angry at them ever since. 

He also knew that since Damian was in a math class far above his age level, he was an easy target. A twelve year old in a room full of seventeen year olds. Even someone as self assured as Damian could feel the sting of peer isolation; he was a still a child after all. 

But he was also Bruce’s child and Bruce had made a name for himself in this town as someone who could not, would not, be bullied. 

00000

Tim was doing something on his computer when Bruce walked into his room and sat down on the bed falling onto his back so that he could essentially lay down with his feet on the floor. It helped the pains in his back to lay like this sometimes. 

“Did I miss dinner again?” he asked, not looking up from whatever he was typing. Bruce glanced at the screen and saw some sort of code.

“What are you doing?” he asked. 

“Upgrading the security on the Teen Titans communicator app,” he replied, finally looking away from he laptop and at Bruce. “What’s up?”

“Did you know that Maxwell Cord is bullying Damian?” he asked. The ringing silence told him that Tim had, in fact, missed that fact. “Apparently, he won’t leave Damian alone. It’s starting to get to him.”

“Didn’t think he could be bullied,” Tim said and Bruce rolled his eyes. 

“Yes, Tim,” he sighed. “Even Damian can be bullied. Especially Damian. Don’t forget, this is the first time he’s ever had to learn how to be around people his own age and status. He’s isolated in a class of older kids and he’s out of his comfort zone.”

“I guess,” Tim told him. “I haven’t seen anything though.”

“That’s probably on purpose,” Bruce reminded him, sitting up again so he could look the boy in the eye. “Just look for him, alright?”

“Of course,” Tim replied, looking at Bruce like he didn’t even understand why Bruce had to make that request at all. Bruce didn’t want to say that is was because he Damian fought, all day, every day. 

Instead he said, “Thank you,” and left Tim to his app. 

00000

Bruce had been hoping that Tim would simply run interference between Maxwell and Damian. Maybe throw around the Wayne name and remind Maxwell that he was dealing with a family far beyond his own in both strength and fortune, which was a language the Cords spoke well. 

What he hadn’t expected given Tim’s history and personality, was to receive an irate call from Headmaster Hammer informing him that Tim had walked up to Maxwell Cord in the cafeteria, said, “Leave my brother alone, bitch,” and punched him in the face, breaking the other boy’s nose. He’d been forced to explain the situation between Cord and Damian, that he’d asked Tim to watch out for his little brother, and that Tim had, apparently, taken to that task with far too much gusto. He sincerely apologized and it was likely only his many donations to the school that had kept Tim from being expelled, though he managed a four day suspension. 

Bruce had also benched him from patrol for a week, something he’d done in front of Damian to discourage any copy cat behavior. Tim had just sat there, in a sullen, teenaged silence and taken it all without protest. 

When Jason had found out he’d laughed himself silly, almost falling off the roof they had met each other on while on separate patrols. Dick had also laughed but had then been thoroughly concerned, his so-called ‘big brother mode’ ramping into full gear. 

Damian’s only response was to quietly hand Tim a bag of his favorite candy a few days later, in a clear acknowledgment of thanks. He didn’t know if the two boys ever spoke about it again, but they were arguing like normal about twenty minutes later so there was that.


End file.
